New powers for state snoopers on the net

The government is drawing up plans to give sweeping new powers to the security and intelligence agencies, and other public bodies, allowing them to access personal data using a wide range of internet sites, including social and gaming networks, Jacqui Smith, the home secretary, signalled yesterday.

In a keynote speech on countering terrorism, she said the police and MI5 needed greater power to pursue suspected criminals and terrorists using new internet sites to conceal their communications. Though she stressed the importance of legal safeguards and public debate, there is little doubt the move will cause serious concern about the erosion of civil liberties and individual privacy.

At present, security and intelligence agencies can demand to see telephone and email traffic from traditional communications services providers, CSPs, which store personal data for their own business reasons, notably for billing customers. However, the rapid expansion of new services offering game playing, social networking, auction and video sites, WiFi access, and broadband present a serious problem for the security services, according to Home Office officials.

This is because new CSPs provided their services free, relying mainly on advertising for money, the officials say. As their services are free the companies do not hold records of their customers, many of whom use a number of pseudonyms and send messages from different electronic addresses.

"People have many accounts and sign up as Mickey Mouse and no one knows who they are", a senior Whitehall security source said. He added: "We have to do something."

"Criminal terrorists are exploiting free social networking sites," said another Whitehall security official.

Communications systems were becoming "increasingly complex and fragmented", Smith said in her speech yesterday to the left-leaning Institute for Public Policy Research. New legislation would "make it possible, one way or another, to collect it and store it", she said, referring to personal data passing through internet sites. She said access to communications data - information about the identity and location of individuals - was a "vital capability" that had been used in 95% of serious crime cases and in nearly all MI5 operations since 2004. The alternative, she said, was a "massive expansion of surveillance and other intrusive measures".

Anticipating a hostile response, Smith distinguished between the interception of communications - accessing the content of phone calls, messages, and emails which need a ministerial warrant - and access to "communications data", which identified the location and name of the caller but not the contents of their calls or messages.

"There are no plans for an enormous database which will contain the content of your emails, the texts that you send or the chats you have on the phone or online. Local authorities do not have the power to listen to your calls now and they never will in future.

"We have every right to be sceptical and questioning about a state activity which involves the collection of data ... and about the ways we already use it." She said she wanted to consult widely in the new year. A communications bill, due later this year, would now be postponed until well into next.

Smith's intervention follows a serious dispute among senior Whitehall officials over a proposal that all communication data records would be held in a central database, a source said yesterday. A significant number of Home Office officials dealing with serious and organised crime believed this approach was impractical and disproportionate, he said.

The Tories warned of the "exponential increase in the powers of the state" any new database could bring. Dominic Grieve, shadow home secretary, said: "While we welcome the consultative approach, Jacqui Smith's speech begs mores questions than it answers." He added: "These proposals would mark a substantial shift in the powers of the state to obtain personal information on individuals. Given the government's poor record on protecting data - and running databases - there needs to be a full and proper debate."

Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman Chris Huhne said: "The government's Orwellian plans for a vast database of our private communications are deeply worrying. I hope that this consultation is not just a sham exercise to soft-soap an unsuspecting public," he said.

Government officials insisted last night that a central database of communications data was just one option in proposals that would be put to consultations.

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